Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Doxpop is excited to announce our latest addition to the Fine Payment network, Perry County, Indiana. Doxpop Fine Payment offers the convenience of paying Perry county and other Indiana county citations on-line with a credit or debit card. Check out our website today at http://payment.doxpop.com to try it out.

The Perry County courts are located in Tell City, Indiana. Other surrounding towns include Cannelton and Troy, Indiana. Major highways running through Perry County include Interstate 64 and State Roads 37, 62, 66, 70, 145, and 545.

Friday, July 15, 2011

Indiana's new texting while driving law has met with some skepticism about how well enforcement will work, but it appears that law enforcement officers are on the job already. We found two cases in the Doxpop database that were filed during the first week that the new law was in effect- The first in Clinton County, and a second in our hometown of Richmond in Wayne County.

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Doxpop is grateful to the many counties thatallow us to provide public access to their information. Local court and recorder information is valuable, and it has always been important to us to provide good value to each community in return for the trust they place in us.

Here's a quick introduction to how we give something back to our state and the communities we serve:

First, it is important to note that we take no money from local government for making public information available via the web. For each county we work with, Doxpop bore the substantial cost of developing the software used to transmit public information to our system. No tax funding was used, no public grant money used, and no additional court filing fees were levied to fund Doxpop. The entire investment was funded solely by the owners of Doxpop in order to provide an immediate, no-risk solution for each county. Contrast this to the hundreds of thousands charged to implement public access systems in other counties, and you'll understand why Doxpop has long been a great solution for local government.

In addition to bearing all development costs, Doxpop initially paid 5% of our gross court-related revenues back to each county we worked with. We made these payments for our first four years, and would still be making these payments to all counties today if it weren't for the intervention of the Indiana Division of State Court Administration. In 2006, the Division added an administrative rule that had the effect of requiring that Doxpop must, at its own expense, undergo an extensive audit if we continued to provide payments to counties based on a percentage of our revenue. The minimum annual cost for such an audit would run to over $35,000.00. We don't make enough money to bear that additional regulatory expense.

In response to this rule change, Doxpop offered each county two options: (1) begin receiving a flat fee so that no audit is required; or (2) receive free services from Doxpop with a value exceeding the previous 5% payments. Most counties opted to go with the free services, and as a result, Prosecutors, Public Defenders and County Law Enforcement were added to the list of county offices receiving free access to information from all counties. Judges, Clerks, Probation, Community Corrections and CASA/GAL volunteers had always had free accounts.

In recent years, responding to funding cuts in many state offices, Doxpop has also begun providing free accounts for many state offices who have asked us to help them. Among these are the Indiana Division of State Court Administration (bit of irony there...), the Indiana Department of Child Services and the Indiana State Police.

Doxpop also provides very basic access to all web users at no cost, including the ability to find any public case, and a free court calendar, so people can confirm when they need to be in court.

In total, roughly half of Doxpop's services are provided at no cost to the over 5,000 users in state and county government offices who pay nothing for our services. Contrast this to systems claiming to offer free access to government users when the supporting systems are actually paid for using public funding. Which definition of "free" feels more honest to you?

On the other side of the coin, we must make a living, so someone has to pay. In our case, it's the commercial users of Doxpop. Instead of being funded by taxes, we're funded by the fees we charge commercial users such as attorneys and background check firms--fair fees that they pay voluntarily.

So that's the basic policy choice that many counties made when they chose Doxpop: If most consumers of the information are commercial users, there's no need to charge all taxpayers for information services that effectively subsidize a small group of businesses. On the other side, by helping us keep our costs low, local government ensures that businesses using Doxpop will get a good deal as well. The roughly 5,000 happy paying users of our system make it evident that this arrangement suits them also.

Giving back to the communities we work with and the state we live in has always been an important part of how we operate. We're owned and operated entirely by folks who are proud to live and work in Indiana. When you call Doxpop, you'll be talking to a Hoosier (please excuse the accent!)

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Doxpop is pleased to announce that Martin County is now using Doxpop's On-line Fine Payment service.

The Martin County Courts in Shoals, Indiana handle citations for drivers in Shoals and other surrounding areas such as Loogootee and Crane. Main highways located in Martin County include US Routes 50, 150, and 231, as well as State Roads 450 and 550. Doxpop Fine Payment allows people with traffic citations in Martin County the convenience of paying their tickets on-line without the need of paying a special trip to the county courthouse or mailing in a money order.

Take a look at our Fine Payment website and try it out today. We can be found at http://payment.doxpop.com.

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Nothing on this blog is legal advice

From time to time we post information designed to help our users who are attorneys interact with the courts from a business process perspective. Doxpop is not a legal firm, and none of these practical tips should be construed as legal advice. If you are an attorney, we hope this information is helpful in running your business. If you are not an attorney and are involved in a court case, the best advice we can give you is to seek competent legal counsel.

About Us

Doxpop is an Indiana company that works with local and state officials to aggregate public information from nearly every Indiana county into a single public database. We seek solutions that provide easy access for all without creating a publicly funded subsidy for the businesses that use public information professionally. Doxpop currently provides access to public information in 91 out of 92 Indiana